


bare your teeth, love on the high seas

by Sanctioned_Chaos



Category: One Piece
Genre: ASL forever, Age Difference, Akagami no Shanks Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Alternate Marineford Events, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Fluff and Angst, He Offers Good Advice, M/M, Oda making me replace every mention of Raftel with Laugh Tale in light of recent chapters goddamit, One-Shot, Portgas D. Ace Is Pretty Asf And It Will Be Talked Abt, Portgas D. Ace Lives, Portgas D. Ace Needs a Hug, Ppl Please Listen To The Angry Redhead, Rarepair, Sengoku and Akainu Tried, Shanks Disagrees Greatly With Whitebeards Choice to Let Ace Leave, Shanks was having None(TM) of It, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Sry Babe, Unbeta-ed We Die Like Pirates, Unfortunately Sabo Didn't Make the Fic Tho, crack ship, he gets one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-13
Updated: 2020-04-13
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:28:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23623153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sanctioned_Chaos/pseuds/Sanctioned_Chaos
Summary: One otherwise innocuous day in January, Akagami no Shanks wakes up with a soulmark that has no business existing. It's, quite literally, a physical impossibility. Try telling Portgas D. Ace that; He'd most assuredly tell you he didn't exactly want to be born either.orTwo goddamn years, Captain, how the fuck?
Relationships: Akagami no Shanks | Red-Haired Shanks/Portgas D. Ace
Comments: 15
Kudos: 355





	bare your teeth, love on the high seas

**Author's Note:**

> yes i'm aware there's an almost-twenty year age difference. i'm also aware that both of these characters are consenting adults by the time anything even happens and this fic is exceedingly tame bc i wasn't trying to fetishize shit and wrote it simply bc i thought it'd be interesting to see how shanks would respond to a soulmate that- for all intents and purposes- shouldn't exist. that's literally it. you can untwist your panties now ya dang purists.
> 
> i'll also probably end up writing a platonic version of this at some point bc i've always thought oda missed out on the opportunity of big brother!shanks in regards to ace and it's just coincidence that the romantic version is what i completed first
> 
> basically, tl:dr if you ride my ass abt the 'morality' of this fic and attempt to breathe a single word of purist bullshit, let me kindly remind you this is FICTION, not that serious, and also that i don't care.
> 
> disclaimer: i own none of these characters, that esteemed honor belongs to one Eichiro Oda. also this was named before i knew both parts of this name are also the names of two other one piece fics respectively lol

Shanks is fourteen years and three months old when he loses the closest thing in his life to a father. Fourteen years and three months old when he loses his captain. Fourteen years and three months old when Gol D. Roger, King of the Pirates, dies on a scaffold in Loguetown. 

But, when he thinks about it again, that’s probably wrong.

Because before all that, before their crew’s quiet dissolution, before his captain places his hat on Shanks’ head and tells him to live free and without regrets, before Roger’s intentional capture- _before all these things_ \- was the sickness.

Before, Roger was bright and unfailing, unfaltering. Bright and loud and wild and _loving_ to his core. Before, Gol D. Roger was _light_. Shanks was his son even then, even when that word was never said aloud by either of them because it was _known_ and what is the point of words in the face of a truth written in your bones?

But then, when everything was good and grand and the closest thing to perfect Shanks had ever had, _then_ came the diagnosis. Like a blade hovering above their captain’s head, a predator in the dark, ready to pounce but delighting in prolonging the pain first. And, to the crew, it was as much a sentencing as it was a statement of fact. 

Roger would die.

Roger would die sooner than any of them ever thought and sooner than anyone had planned, the Navy’s bold but foolhardy declarations of capturing him be damned.

And after it was done, after Roger shook his head and laughed- _laughed from his belly, the widest smile on his face_ \- and threw the drink in his hand down his gullet, then everything went fast. Everything dialed up to eleven and Shanks remembers all of it, remembers the thrill and the freedom and the urgency(it was never brought up, never acknowledged, but always _always_ there). They didn’t get enough time, not any of them. Before the third year’s end Laugh Tale was in sight and what came next? Only their captain would know.

He’d had it all planned the whole time.

And Shanks? Well Shanks had hoped beyond hope for a miracle, hoped Crocus’s addition would change something, _anything_. Give Shanks more time living life caught within his father’s unfailing magnetism. But they were pirates and so they were greedy and what time they did get wasn’t enough. Could never be enough.

Because of course not, _of course_ they wouldn’t be so lucky.

So when they were done, when Laugh Tale was found and conquered, Roger set the Oro Jackson to sail for a familiar Blue. He set a course East and, if there were ever a moment they should have known his plan, Shanks thinks it might have been then. Because captain sat them down and captain told them the task was done. The road ended. The legend written and the chapter closed. And captain, because he was captain, smiled and asked of his crew something no crew ever wishes to be asked.

Departure. 

Dissolution.

To walk the lonely road again. 

And, because Roger had never been a man anyone could say no to, _least of all_ his own crew, they’d said yes. Nights of drinking and fighting and crying and decision-making and, one by one, reluctantly, they listened. Carried out.

_Captain’s orders_ , his father had said.

And Shanks loved him- _trusted_ him- as they all did, so they were obedient.

He and Buggy were the last to leave save for Rayleigh. Buggy, grumbling about their captain’s selfishness and doing his best to hide his shaking, refused to look back. To look behind. But Shanks was weak then. Would still be weak, if the him of now were made to do it all over again. 

Nothing with Roger was ever easy after all, especially the leaving. 

So Shanks looked back, saw his captain standing by Oro’s main mast- _smiling, god he was always smiling even then_ \- and lowered the straw hat on his head. Because, at some point, he couldn’t stand looking anymore. The wound was still fresh and, years after, it ached upon remembrance.

The news of his capture comes shortly after. 

They thought he’d escape, every single one of them- separated and at least as far one of the blues away from each other- had been sure of it. _Counted_ on it. Privately made bets on their captain making some grand display as a reminder to the world of his presence, his _power_ , before leaving the Navy in the dust and maybe- just maybe- calling them back for more adventures, as much as they could’ve had. But the execution date neared and Shanks’ doubts grew. He and Buggy had long gone their separate ways as well but they kept den-dens, as much as the latter of the two pretended the other didn’t exist even he couldn’t deny it would only be smart to keep track of at least one familiar face. And they were young, the youngest on their crew, so it couldn’t be helped.

Shanks doesn’t remember who called who but he remembers the long moments of silence. Remembers the soft, hesitant question that came after what seemed like hours of quiet. Neither of them wanted to breathe it out but it came out all the same.

“You don’t think?”

“No. No way.”

“...”

The silence came back in full force after that and, eventually, one of them had hung up. Shanks remembers not being able to fall asleep that night, the sound of the den-den mushi’s dial tone echoing in his mind like a final death knell.

A month later and captain died. 

The bonfire that was Gol D. Roger’s life, snuffed out, too easily and _far_ too early. And Shanks? Shanks watched it only a few feet removed from the executioner’s block, had to suppress a violent urge to hack up the entire contents of his stomach right then and there onto the floor because _goddammit Captain was going to die, Shanks wouldn’t do him the dishonor of looking away for any reason_. A period of Shanks’ memory is still missing from that day. He vaguely remembers walking out of that crowd cut and bruised and bleeding- _he must’ve struggled then, tried to claw his way to Roger’s body, thank god for Buggy stopping him_ \- passing out somewhere in a nearby forest. Buggy had waited for him to regain consciousness before turning tail and taking the next ship out of Loguetown. (As far as Shanks knows, Buggy had only gone back once more since that day- when it was Anchor’s turn. Shanks still needs to ask him what that was about; why the hell had Buggy ever thought it a good idea to put Shanks’ kid on that same godforsaken platform? There are some things Luffy shares with Roger sure- the hat, the smile, the same unbending will- but for fucks sake never that.) 

The following year, he gains himself a first mate and- a few months after that- a sniper. Benn and Yasopp are great, they’re _family_ , and Shanks holds onto them for dear life. He won’t make false pretenses as if they weren’t the only things keeping him alive for a long while. Akagami no Shanks was always reckless but never so dangerously so as the year that followed Roger’s death. His will to live kept intact only by the handful of men he’d gathered beside him. Shanks trusted them with his life in an altogether different way back then.(Responsible for himself alone, he was prone to try taking it.)

He _loves_ them, _supports_ them, _trusts_ them, _goads_ them, fights with _and_ against them but it’s two years after the start of the new pirate era that he no longer clings to them. 

Two years after his captain’s- his _father’s_ \- death, Shanks wakes up one January morning, already drunk out of his mind, and finds- shortly after locating the nearest restroom- a name emblazoned on the underside of his left pec. 

_Two years_ after the loss of his captain’s life, _two years_ after the greatest shift in Shanks’ world, he finds meaning again. Clarity. Purpose.

_Two years_ of non-stop drinking and fighting and drawing crewmates to himself like a madman desperate to fill a hole that had no bottom, Shanks’ consciousness- _his entire being_ \- zeroes in on six letters. 

_Two years_ of clawing desperation, bone-deep exhaustion, and perpetual inebriation- and Shanks sobers up in three seconds flat. The exact length of time it takes for his vision to stop being hazy and actually focus on his body in the mirror. 

_Two years._

But no matter how he looks at it- no matter how he pulls at the skin to inspect if this is some sick joke played on him by an entirely-too-knowledgeable party of who knows how many- Shanks can’t unsee it.

_It’s been two fucking years._

And it doesn’t make sense, not one bit, but the words are still there.

_Two goddamn years, Captain, how the fuck?_

But there they are. There, in the dip of his ribs and just underneath his heart, stretch six perfect- six _cruel_ \- letters written in what can only be soulmate script.

_Why now? HOW now?_

He stares at them some more, feels his vision turn hazy for a completely different reason than drunkenness, and Shanks allows himself one tear.

Two years and finally- _blissfully_ \- he feels the weight of grief loosen its grip. Only a little, barely even enough to really notice, but it’s there and it makes all the difference.

_Two years, six letters, an impossibility wrapped in a mystery and born from tragedy._

Shanks stares. And stares. And stares.

Two years later and he finally lets himself breathe.

Two years and there they are. Six letters, beautiful and cruel but a blessing all the same.

Two years and a name.

_Two years_ and **_Gol D. Ace._ **

He’d heard of Baterilla, heard but never dared to hope. Not even a little. Because Shanks- Shanks the way he was after Roger’s death- couldn’t have handled hope. The months his captain spent in captivity- _wasted on resignation instead of putting up a fight_ , some bitter part of him thinks- taught Shanks hope was an ugly thing. Disappointing.

So yes, he read all about Baterilla in the News Coo, but he hadn’t _dared_. He wouldn’t open himself to hope again, raged silently at even just the thought. 

But then came January, two years after the fact, and Shanks did. He dared with all the might in his body, watched his mark daily, watched for a change, watched for them to turn grey with tragedy- with a child’s life cut short for too many reasons to count- but it didn’t happen. Seventeen years passed and it _didn’t_ happen. 

Seventeen years, Shanks one hat less, and there he stands. Bold and bright and defiant, his soulmate bows at the mouth of a cave and thanks _him._

(Meanwhile, Shanks thanks Roger, Rouge, _Davy Fucking Jones_ himself. His impossible soulmate lived.)

Ace thanks him because Shanks- all those years ago, all those years after he’d reopened himself to hope- had saved a boy of seven in a little town in the East Blue. A little boy with a shine in his eyes too reminiscent of a man Shanks used to know and soon he was giving an arm and a hat to secure them all a future. Because Shanks had a vested interest in a boy he’d watch become an anchor before his very eyes and so Shanks gave bits and pieces of himself to give Luffy a chance. 

And Ace is here- _Ace is Luffy’s brother_ \- and Shanks is both weaker and stronger than he was all those years ago. Weak to loss and to hope but also stronger than ever in the face of a second chance.

And, perhaps more importantly, Shanks is a _pirate_.

Shanks is an _Emperor_.

And so he is selfish.

He keeps Ace and his crew in that cave with his own family, pours them booze and shares stories, and _the entire time_ he doesn’t take his eyes off hope. Grips it in his hand with the kind of tenacity and greed only a pirate emperor can, and doesn’t let go.

Benn shoots him a few concerned looks through the night but Shanks waves them off, pours Fire Fist another cup, and watches. Just watches. 

Shanks memorizes his laugh and his freckles and the little scar on the underside of his chin that Luffy had apparently given him and the way his hair tousles after a particularly amusing story and Shanks, greedy and starved, _wants_.

He _wants_ and Ace stares back, young but far from blind. Shanks wants and Ace tilts his head and smiles. It’s a small thing, hesitant- rife with worries that shouldn’t be there because god Shanks is desperate and fucking famished and Ace is beautiful and good and a light in his life all over again- and Shanks wants to kills something. 

Shanks wants to drive his sword into something _solid_ , something with _flesh_ , _something that bleeds_ because Ace- joyful as he may seem- is worried. Ace is holding back and Shanks is selfish, yes, but he is also patient. Akagami no Shanks lets the Spades Pirates leave the cave after two days of drinking and partying but not before having a talk with his soulmate.

It’s more of what they don’t say that matters. Shanks gives Ace his vivre card, watches the younger man grip it tight before placing it in his breast pocket carefully, gently, and whispers words of ‘see me again’ and ‘be safe’. Ace, to all his credit, tries not to blush and Shanks is patient, yes, but his soulmate is wonder incarnate and Shanks can’t help but be selfish too.

He goes in slowly, gives the younger pirate every opportunity to reject him, and smiles softly as he plants a long kiss on Fire Fist Ace’s flushed forehead.

  
  
  
  
  


It’s a relationship built slowly and over a period of three years, Ace’s induction into Whitebeard’s crew and Shank’s unavoidable pouting their next meeting immediately after, but it’s loving all the same. He doesn’t regret any of it, never could, and he’s proud to find out Ace doesn’t either. They can’t always meet up when they like, both having their own distinct spheres of influence and subsequent responsibilities but, when they do, they spend every waking moment together. Shanks welcomes Ace on board the Red Force, grabs him by his closest available exposed surface(which is a lot now that he’s ditched the shirt to bear Whitebeard’s symbol on his back), and kisses him long and hard. Properly, now. His crew, blessed as they are, never miss out on a chance to tease and Shanks high-fives them when he can because Ace, blushing? That’s a sight he’d always have before his eyes if given the chance. 

It’s a slow process mainly because Ace has a lot of barriers Shanks completely and utterly respects. Even if he wants to murder someone after finding out just why. Roger is a sensitive topic for both of them, for multiple reasons, and that’s totally fine. Ace was trying to see him from Shanks’ perspective more every time but Shanks never pushed, hated the feeling of being trapped so much himself and unwilling to make his soulmate experience it as much as he could.

(They’re both pirates to their bones, the sea calling their blood. Freedom has always sung sweetest to their ilk.)

Ace doesn’t meet him after Thatch dies and Shanks understands. Shanks gets it. But Shanks is also worried out of his mind and Whitebeard needs to be made aware. Except Whitebeard postures and Whitebeard bristles because he thinks Shanks is underestimating his son and Shanks wants to rage, wants to balk at the mere thought of such an injustice to Ace, but instead he bears it. He bears the weight of his worry like he did all those years ago- when it was a different D. to be ushered to the scaffold- but this time he pays closer attention.

He stews in his anger once more but, this time, he plans as well.

This time, he has his crew.

This time, Akagami no Shanks is something- someone- he never was all those years ago with Roger.

This time Shanks is Captain, and Emperor, and _Soulmate_.

And so, this time, Akagami no Shanks wages war.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


He is both thankful and regretful at their decision to hide each other’s names exactly two years(that number follows him around so much he’s almost come to hate it) before Marineford.

Thankful because Ace didn’t need more of a target on his back than the one he already had and because Shanks is not so willing to share this part of the world that is his with everyone else. Thankful because Ace preferred _Portgas_ , wanted to be known as himself first before the unfortunate offspring of a long-gone sperm donor, and Shanks is more than agreeable because a)the Navy can fuck right off and b) Shanks doesn’t want to rob so many families of their sons, brothers, and husbands quite yet.

(He’s known since that day in January that there’d be a need for it, knows he’d commit himself to war in a heartbeat for his other half, but he’s never prided himself on killing.)

_A man fights because he loves those behind him, not because he hates what is in front of him._

But today, today that changes.

Because Sengoku is a stubborn fuck and _wants_ Shanks to go batshit insane.

Shanks spends his time as Emperor partying and the Navy forgets he’d earned that title in all of six years after leaving the East Blue. 

He’s more than ready to remind them.

Whitebeard gets there first because Whitebeard is great but Whitebeard is also old and sloppy and Shanks lags behind protecting his territory. Kaido, the whelp, deserves all that Shanks gives him for making him late.

But when he does arrive, sooner than he might’ve had he not had a _very_ vested interest in the cause of this war, Marineford splits. He sees Ace on that scaffold and Benn doesn’t even try keeping him back, _Benn pushes him off_.

“Get up there, Okashira. Get up there before we kill every single one of these marines with our bare hands.”

Akagami no Shanks is selfish but, just this once when he wants nothing but to do this one thing, he is also merciful. Merciful to the marine. 

He locks eyes with a crying Ace, a shell-shocked Luffy, and a relieved Marco the Phoenix.

Did he mention Marineford splits? 

Because Akainu tries putting hands on Luffy as he drags Ace down and away(he finds out later how many close calls there’d been with his soulmate’s gorgeous curly-haired head and it takes Benn, Yasopp, and Ace himself to keep him from hunting Sengoku down and _filleting_ him alive), Shanks throws his mercy right out the damn window. Haki kissing his blade, Akainu takes Shanks’ sword to the face for his stunt and Shanks follows his body as it falls. Buries his sword deeper and twists, a long scar fracturing the stone beneath all their feet. (This is the moment he earns Garp’s approval.) Marineford grows silent and Sengoku stands horrified, alone on the scaffold where he’d threatened to shift Shanks’ world on its axis for the second time.

Shanks had promised the Navy blood for this and his appetite- rare as it is to make an appearance- has far to go before it’s sated. 

The only thing that stops him is Whitebeard’s death and Ace’s hand on his sleeve. Shanks’ soulmate stares him right in his enraged eyes and tiredly shakes his head, looking down at an unconscious Luffy. Anchor had pushed himself too far already and Ace doesn’t need to see this, he doesn’t need to see what Blackbeard’s doing to his father’s body. So Shanks’ kisses him lightly on the cheek, nudges him gently to Benn, and ends the war right then and there.

Teach will burn another day but it won’t be this one. That’s Ace’s score to settle and Shanks is going to give him every opportunity to claim it, _after_ he’s healed and ready. (Shanks is teaching him Awakening before he lets Ace out of his sight again, assuming he’ll let that happen within the next decade.) For now, Shanks is content to be selfish- holding his soulmate in his arms as the Red Force and Whitebeard’s remaining Mobies sail away- Ace lamenting the death of the only man he’d truly regarded as _Father_ . Shanks buries his face in dark curls, the scent of salt-and-pewter( _fucking seastone_ ) and ash filling his lungs. Ace’s sobs are muffled against the crook of his neck and Shanks never shushes him, only rubbing soothing circles into the blanket covering Ace’s trembling back.

More than anyone, he understands.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> lbr this fic ended up being WAY shorter than i had initially planned but it was mainly writing from emotions instead of actually planning anything in great detail and that's usually what happens when i write things with that method lol. this was originally going to be btwn 8k-10k but instead became only 3k+, big oof.
> 
> i absolutely ADORE one piece with the fullness of my heart and soul and plan on eventually writing a longfic for the fandom but, unfortunately, today is not that day. 
> 
> also, if you're here from my many other fics that i've yet to complete or update: i'm so, so sorry. no i haven't given up on them. yes i plan on updating them. this is actually an old work i ended up revisiting today to edit and then ultimately post even tho that wasn't the original plan. i promise i'm trying to find time to work on my other wips but, unfortunately, balancing online classes and upcoming finals isn't making this an ideal writing environment.


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